AMY GOODMAN: This is Democracy Now!, democracynow.org, The War and Peace Report. I’m Amy Goodman, with Juan González.

In Colorado, ICE agents, Immigration and Customs Enforcement, have detained the prominent immigrant rights activist Jeanette Vizguerra. The agents picked her up at a Denver-area Target where she worked. She’s now being held in an ICE detention center in Aurora that’s run by the private prison company GEO Group.

Jeanette Vizguerra gained national attention in 2017 when she took sanctuary at a Denver church along with her four children — three of whom are U.S.-born — to avoid deportation. Time magazine named her one of the 100 most influential people in 2017. She has lived in the United States for almost 30 years since leaving Mexico City in 1997 with her husband and her then-6-year-old daughter.

On Tuesday, her supporters gathered outside the ICE jail in the freezing rain where she’s being held, and she called in to the rally.

JEANETTE VIZGUERRA: [translated] Thank you. I want you to know I’m not going to surrender. I’m going to keep fighting. And even if they remove me, I’m going to continue doing binational work, and they are not going to silence my voice.

LUNA BÁEZ VIZGUERRA: OK. OK, everybody, Jeanette is on the phone right now. What do we have to say to her?

SUPPORTERS: We love you, Jeanette! We love you! Free Jeanette!

JEANETTE VIZGUERRA: [translated] Thank you to everyone that is there. I really thank you for all the time you have been by my side during these 16 years we’ve been fighting. I’m hopeful I’m going to be able to leave here and continue my fight and for others, because inside here there are many injustices. There are a lot of women that their cases are not being reviewed, and I’m going to try to help them, even being here in detention.

AMY GOODMAN: That was the immigrant rights activist Jeanette Vizguerra calling from an ICE jail hours after she was detained. And her voice was on speakerphone to those who had gathered to support her outside, the phone being held by her daughter.

We’re joined now by two guests: Jennifer Piper, program director at American Friends Service Committee, Colorado, doing coordination support for Jeanette, and Luna Báez Vizguerra, the 21-year-old daughter of Jeanette, who was holding that phone outside the ICE jail. Now, let’s remember, this is Aurora, Colorado. Aurora, Colorado, and Springfield, Ohio, were what Trump, when running for president, promised would be ground zero for deportations.

I want to start with Jennifer. What’s happening here? I mean, we know the case of Jeanette Vizguerra so well over the years, went into the Denver church, where she had taken sanctuary. Why has she been targeted now?

JENNIFER PIPER: Good morning.

Yeah, there is no reason for her to be targeted right now, in terms of legally. The administration doesn’t have a valid deportation order. And their act to try and remove her this week violates her due process rights.

You know, in terms of any other reason why they might be targeting Jeanette, she’s long been a leader. Since she arrived to the United States in 1997, she began union organizing. She joined an immigrant rights organization. She was the first person in the country, among the first, to make her deportation case public in 2009 and really exposed the machinery and the cruelty of our deportation machine, which is vast in the United States. And no matter who the administration was, Jeanette has always stood and will continue to stand for justice and for dignity for all people.

JUAN GONZÁLEZ: And do you think that she was targeted because of her advocacy?

JENNIFER PIPER: I mean, it seems possible in this environment. We’re still hopeful that Immigration and Customs Enforcement will recognize their error and reinstate her due process rights within the immigration system. Her lawyer has filed a habeas and also a motion at the district court — at the circuit court, excuse me, the 10th Circuit Court, to review her case. And so, we are hopeful that immigration will come to the table.

AMY GOODMAN: Let’s bring Luna Báez Vizguerra into the conversation. Luna, you’re 21. I remember you years ago when we were covering Jeanette in the church. Now, you were standing outside yesterday in the freezing rain, holding up that cellphone so your mother could be heard. You have said that your mother had noticed unmarked vehicles following her for the past few days when she was leaving work and when she was on break. Can you talk about that and what your fears are right now? I mean, the mayor of Denver has called for her to be released.

LUNA BÁEZ VIZGUERRA: I would say, in regards to kind of the unmarked vehicles, it’s something that is very, very scary. It’s something that she — she’s always very vigilant, because, obviously, in her circumstances, there is a lot to be worried about, especially just regarding documentation status. And it comes to find out that there were also some people without uniforms that were kind of watching her from inside the store and that they were just waiting for her to go on break to be able to make their arrest.

AMY GOODMAN: I want to go back to 2017, when I interviewed Jeanette Vizguerra inside the First Unitarian Society, the church, of Denver, where she had taken refuge.

AMY GOODMAN: Are you prepared for ICE to come in at any time.

JEANETTE VIZGUERRA: [translated] Yes. We have an internal plan here at the church, and not only at this church, also at the church where Ingrid is, who is at the other church in Mountain View. She has been in sanctuary for over three months. Both churches are part of the Metro Denver Sanctuary Coalition, and each church has its own emergency plan. I am also prepared. Before coming here, I prepared a family plan in case ICE were to go to my house. Part of the plan with my children was that one of them would be filming, and the other one would be calling people from a list that I gave them. And here, we have a similar plan. So I am prepared, and so are the people here. We hope that Donald Trump will respect these spaces. It would look wrong from a moral standpoint if he came after mothers who are just fighting for their families.

AMY GOODMAN: So, that’s Jeanette Vizguerra back in 2017 during Trump one, the first Trump administration, terrified that she would be removed from her children. As we wrap up, Jennifer Piper, what is the plan right now?

JENNIFER PIPER: Yeah, so, over her entire case, her entire fight of the last 16 years, every moment, her struggle and her leadership, her community have made the impossible possible. So the plan is to continue to do that, to utilize the courts. All of the congressional Democrats in Colorado have spoken out and called for her due process rights to be respected, as well as the mayor, the governor, as you mentioned. That’s all because of the power that Jeanette has built over her organizing career and the connections that she has with other people.

The courts may not save us, but we save each other. Only the people can save each other and make justice and democracy real. And that’s what we’ll continue to do into the future. We’ll continue to have a presence at the detention center. We’ll continue to support her family and their leadership. They’re really the ones who are leading this fight.

AMY GOODMAN: I want to thank you so much for being with us, Jennifer Piper, program director, American Friends Service Committee, Colorado, and Luna Báez Vizguerra, daughter of Jeanette Vizguerra. To see our interviews with Jeanette over the years, you can go to democracynow.org.

Coming up, we look at the Trump administration’s efforts to sabotage Social Security. Stay with us.